Walking the streets of Hightown .... a full century ago

I remain in awe of those writers who can sum up someone in a few simple sentences.

Outside lavatory, Back Percival Street, 1951

Dickens could do it, and today I came across a short description of a Mrs. Poyser which is up there with the best.

It comes from the novel, Magnolia Street by Louis Golding, which was based on the streets in Hightown in Manchester during the 1920s.

These were the streets he remembered from his youth, and in particular the uneasy relationship between Jew and Gentile.

He was born in the city in 1895 to a Ukrainian-Jewish family, described his politics as “strongly to the left” and in 1938 wrote The Jewish Problem which was published as a Penguin Special.*

The Jewish Problem, 1938

The book examines the history of antisemitism, and Zionism, against the backdrop of “The Nazi Horror” and concludes with a final chapter on  “The Future”

But he was also a prolific popular novelist, and I can see why, because his description of Mrs. Poyser  who ran a grocery shop on Magnolia Street perfectly recreates one of those people we have all come across.   “The Jewish women met socially in Mrs. Poyser’s grocery shop, facing the Lamb and Lion.  

There they forgathered in between the washing up after one meal and the preparation for the next; or they called in on their way from the market, to show what a fat chicken they had picked up or how fine a silver hake for chopping and frying.

On a certain Sunday morning in May in the year 1910, there was news and news of the Mrs. Poyser’s sort.  News was, in a sense, Mrs. Poyser’s prerogative.  She weighed it, she sorted it out into bags, she handed it over the counter, along with a pair of kippers or a pound of sultanas”.**

Back Percival Street, 1951

The book, which was written in 1932, had its roots in a series of short pieces he had sent into the Manchester Guardian a decade earlier, describing life from the Jewish side of Magnolia Street which the newspaper had rejected as “nonsense”.

His response was in his own words “to mobilise the Jews on one side of the Street and the Gentiles on the other side and make of them – and this is a thing which has been ignored in references to the book – a study not of Jew-Gentile problems but of the problems which assert themselves when two communities are found in close proximity to one another.  The sort of thing which happened in Magnolia Street to the dwellers on one side or the other are what happened exactly in a street in Belfast in which Orangemen lived one side and Catholics on the other and in Tunis where at the end of a certain area the French lived on side and the Italians on the other”.***

At present I am only on chapter two, with a full 500 pages a head of me, and not wanting to spoil the experience, I haven’t turned to the back, but my spoiler alert, with help from another Manchester Guardian article is that Didsbury features along the way.

Percival Street, Holt Town, 1953

Well, we shall see.

What did intrigue me, was that Mr. Golding was participating in “the formal opening of the new library set up by Messrs. Kendal, Milne and Co. in their Deansgate establishment [to a large audience] “on The workshop of the novelist’s brain”.****

Now that I would have liked to have been part of.

And in a sort of way I should also have liked to have walked those streets in Hightown that he knew so well.

Of course, they have mostly gone, cleared away in the clearance programmes of the second half of the last century.  But there are a few pictures, and in particular the two that appear here.  Both are of Back Percival Street, a small slip of a place which didn’t warrant a listing in the directories and doesn’t get recorded by name on the maps.

But my Facebook friend Bill Sumner, swiftly located the street where I thought it might be beside Percival Street, which was off Waterloo Road which in turn connected Bury New Road to Cheetham Hill Road.

Leaving me just to reflect on those two images of Back Percival Street, which are a powerful reminder of just how tough the area could be, whether you were Jew or Gentile.

Location; Hightown

Pictures; Outside lavatory, Back Percival Street, 1951, m08286 and m08291, courtesy of Manchester Libraries, Information and Archives, Manchester City Council, http://images.manchester.gov.uk/index.php?session=pass, cover from The Jewish Problem, 1938 and extract from the OS map showing Percival Street in Holt Town and surrounding streets

* The Jewish Problem, Louis Golding, November 1938, reprinted, November 1938, and January 1939

**Magnolia Street, Louis Golding, 1932

***The Making of a Novel - Mr. Louis Golding and “Magnolia Street”, Manchester Guardian, March 9th, 1935

****Ibid The Making of a Novel

Looking inside a grand Victorian house …. Rye Bank and the story of Mr. Bryce Smith ... part 1

In the course of the last few days I have got to know a lot about Mr. Bryce Smith, who lived at Rye Bank in Chorlton, described himself as a “calico printer”, owned a  prestigious warehouse on Nicholas Street in Manchester, and a factory in Whalley near Blackburn.

Inventory, 1891

I doubt I would ever have gone looking for him if I hadn’t been shown an inventory of the contents of his home which was made shortly after his death in 1892.

The inventory is now in the possession of Chris Griffiths who thought I would be interested, which of course I am.

Because, here spread over 57 foolscap pages and bound in  leather is an insight in to just what a wealthy family accumulated in their home.

Looking through the inventory I noted that the list of Mr. Smith’s library was covered  21 pages, his collection of oil paintings, water colour drawings and engravings over another two pages and his silver and plated articles across two more pages.

And that is just what caught my eye, leaving me to explore the full nineteen rooms along with the lists of linen, glass, and china.

Index to the Inventory, 1892

All of which will reveal much about the life of one well off Victorian family, here in Chorlton in the late 19th century.

The warehouse on Nicholas Street, 1883

Now, I knew of the existence of Rye Bank which stood in extensive grounds, facing Edge Lane and extending along the side of Ryebank Road, but I knew little of the people who occupied it or just when the house was demolished.

Just when the family moved into the property is a little unclear.  They were there by 1871, but may have been elsewhere on Edge Lane before that.

Either way in 1871 the Rate Books reveal that Mr. Smith was occupying Rye Bank which he owned, and he stayed for two decades.  The house had an annual estimated a rateable value of £229, which marked it off as the largest property on this bit of Edge Lane.

But then Bryce Smith was a wealthy man.  He left £162,622 on his death and his warehouse and offices on Nicholas Street, which are still there, bear witness to his financial standing.

There is a lot more.  His papers are deposited the Lancashire County Archive, and contain amongst other things  the “Bill of Quantities for the erection of a warehouse in Nicholas Street. Manchester for Bryce Smith Esq” in the August of 1873.

So watch this space.

Location; Chorlton

Pictures; pages from the Inventory Rye Bank Chorlton-cum-Hardy, 1892, courtesy of Chris Griffiths, and the Nicholas Street, showing the Smith warehouse, 1883, from Goads Fire Insurance maps, courtesy of Digital Archives Association, http://digitalarchives.co.uk/

*Bryce Smith Papers, DDX 2/37Lancashire County Archives,

https://archivecat.lancashire.gov.uk/CalmView/Overview.aspx

One hundred years of one house on Well Hall Road, part 1, reflections

Well Hall Road and our house 2014

The story of one house over a century and a bit.*

2015 was the birthday of the house we lived in for thirty years.

We moved into 294 Well Hall Road in March 1964 and while us kids slowly moved out over the years it remained my dad’s home till 1994.

So this will be the start of a series of stories about the house which next year will celebrate its centenary.

Now despite spending most days digging deep into the past and uncovering the lives of those who interest me I have to confess that the people who occupied our house for the first forty-nine years are unknown to me.

But their lives will span the two world wars, along with the uncertain years that followed the end of the first war and the growing prosperity that came in the decades after 1945.

In the garden 1964

And more than anything it will be about the house and how it changed from a fairly basic but well built early 20th century property to one which was adapted to the growth in consumer products, central heating and the revolution in leisure.

So when we moved in in 1964, there was still a water heater which had been run off a solid fuel stove, the kitchen possessed just two power points and the windows were the originals that had come with the house in 1915.

The first residents would have gone off to work on the tram, and no doubt welcomed the new Well Hall Odeon which offered up evenings of excitement and was far closer than the first picture house up along the High Street.

And on those fine warm summer evenings there would still have been plenty of open spaces to enjoy.

The real discoveries will also be in just how their lives in the late 1920s and 30s matched and contrasted with those of the people I so often deal with who lived in the north  in the more challenged old industries of textiles, coal mining and ship building.

So it is all there to search out, and on the way I am well aware that George, Jean and Chrissie will be on hand to offer up their memories of their bit of Well Hall and Eltham.

Location; Well Hall, Eltham, London

Pictures; from the collection of Andrew Simpson, 1964  and Chrissie Rose 2015

*One hundred years of one house on Well Hall Road,
https://chorltonhistory.blogspot.com/search/label/One%20hundred%20years%20of%20one%20house%20in%20Well%20Hall

The door to the books ……

 Another in celebration of Chorlton places Chorltonplaces with history.

Chorlton Bookshop Chorlton Bookshop.**

Location; Chorlton

Picture; Chorlton Bookshop, 2024 from the collection of Andrew Simpson

*Chorlton Bookshop, https://chorltonhistory.blogspot.com/search?q=chorlton+bookshop

*Chorlton Bookshop, https://chorltonbookshop.co.uk/

Rediscovering our rural past, Thomas Ellwood and Mrs W C Williamson

We owe a great debt to the historians of the late 19th century who captured the memories of the people who lived in south Manchester when most of it was still countryside.

Thomas Ellwood and Mrs Williamson were working at a time when the rural communities of Chorlton, Burnage, Fallowfield and Rusholme were on the cusp of disappearing.

Within a generation they had all but gone and with it was went a rich storehouse of stories and popular culture.

Today what was left is fast fading from living memory, so with in another decade I doubt that there will be any left who remember the blacksmith on Beech Road or being sent to one of the local farms to collect fresh milk and butter.

This makes it exciting when there comes along an opportunity to give a wider audience the chance to read about that rural past.

Thomas Ellwood lived here in Chorlton and during the winter of 1885 into the spring of ’86 he collected and wrote accounts of Chorlton dating back into the 17th century.

These were published in the South Manchester Gazette and are available in Central Library, but they are on microfilm which makes them a tad more difficult to read.  Some of the articles reappeared in various church magazines but I have yet to find a complete set outside the Gazette.

In the case of Mrs Williamson her work appeared in a slender edition in 1888 and I have only been able to put my hands on one copy again from Central Library.

However Bruce Anderson whose local history site I have mentioned from time to time has digitized his own copy along with a number of other histories of Burnage, Fallowfield and Rusholme and they appear on Rusholme and Victoria Park Archive at  http://rusholmearchive.org/

‘Sketches of Fallowfield and the surrounding Manors, Past & Present’ By Mrs Williamson, “gives a very interesting account of how Fallowfield developed from fields between Rusholme & Withington in the 14th century, gradually becoming a desirable neighbourhood with church, chapel & schools in the third quarter of the 19th century. 

There are three maps, 1818, 1843 and 1885 that illustrate the changes during these years.”

She lived in Fallowfield with her husband, Professor William Crawford Williamson FRS. He was an eminent Victorian scientist who was appointed as the first Professor of Natural History (Geology, Zoology and Botany) at Manchester in 1851. 

Williamson was one of the great Victorian naturalists who knew and actively corresponded with Charles Darwin, Louis Agassiz, T.H. Huxley and other great scientists of the day. 

He also knew John Dalton and famously tended the great man during his final days, feeding him broth and other liquid sustenance. Williamson trained as a doctor and practised as an eye surgeon as well as pursuing his studies in the natural sciences.”

It is a wonderful book because it draws on the memories of those who experienced that rural life, and was a great help to me when writing my own account of Chorlton in the first half of the 19th century.*

And so for anyone wanting a vivid firsthand account of the handloom weavers of Burnage or the rush cart ceremony of Rusholme, Mrs Williamson and Bruce’s site have got to be worth a visit.

*THE STORY OF CHORLTON-CUM-HARDY, http://chorltonhistory.blogspot.co.uk/2012/10/the-story-of-chorlton-cum-hardy-new.html

Pictures; Chorlton from the collection of Tony Walker, cover of Mrs Williamson's book from the collection of Bruce Anderson

Crossing the river at Woolwich

Growing up in Eltham meant that you were never far from the River.

But this was the working part of the Thames and not that pretty bit admired by tourists or the picturesque section further up river where the glittering and wealthy favour.

It was instead the busy noisy waterway flanked by grimy power stations, timber yards, small boat building businesses and unromantic factories.

And of course of barges, work a day tugs and the occasional tramp steamer.

But because this was the doing bit of the Thames whole sections of the river side were locked off or just visible down a flight of slimy stone steps, all of which meant that travelling on the ferry offered up a chance to see the Thames at its best even if it was a tad smelly and dirty.*

That said I remember it as an adventure made all the more memorable on cold wet days in Februaruy when the wind swept in from the open expanse of water managing to get through all the layers of your clothes.

And even now when I come across that ozone smell it takes me back to the ferry crossing.

Not  that I ever travelled on the Gordon which had gone by the time we moved to Well Hall in the early 1960s but the power station was still doing its bit to keep the lights on.

“The first station was opened at the site in 1893 by the Woolwich District Electric Lighting Company adapted from boat repair shops, and subsequently taken over by the Metropolitan Borough of Woolwich.

During later construction work in 1912 the timbers of a Tudor warship believed to be Henry VII's 1488 ship Sovereign were uncovered on the site.

The station was redeveloped in the 1920s and again in the 1940s and 1950s, ultimately having three huge brick chimneys. It occupied a site of just over seven and a half acres.”**

Some where I have a set of pictures I took of the place but they are so safely stored away that I have long lost any hope of finding them, which means these two from Steve Bardrick’s collection are pretty special to me.

I don’t have a date but they predate the introduction of the new ferries in 1963 and long before the reinforced concrete terminals which date from the following year.

Even with the new ferries and those giant approach ways a trip across can still be magic.

So having messed up on M25 and heading home we made the river crossing at Woolwich and the ferry’s power worked all over again this time on Tina whose family is from Naples and is no stranger to open water ferries and big ships.


Pictures; the Thames, the ferry and a power station, date unknown, courtesy of Steve Bardrick and the ferry in 2012 from the collection of Andrew Simpson

*Woolwich Ferry,http://chorltonhistory.blogspot.co.uk/search/label/Woolwich%20Ferry 

**Woolwich Power Station, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Woolwich_Power_Station

The Bella Napoli on Kennedy Street ............ where we learned to love pizza

Now I won’t be alone in having fond memories of the Bella Napoli on Kennedy Street.

Neapolitan pizza, 2017

It opened in 1973 just three years after the Isola Bella and we were there pretty much from the beginning, and carried on going throughout the 1970s.

Since then I have eaten pizza in Naples, tried the Metre Pizza, sampled Bob Amato’s special from his wood burning oven in the garden, and regularly bought slices from the Chinese takeaway in Varese.*

But it was at the Bella Napoli that I had my first pizza.

Back then it tended always to be the quattro stagioni, accompanied by a glass of wine and followed by chocolate ice cream.

I can’t remember how we came across, it probably on one of our wanders around town, and it was our place, which we shared with family and friends but remained “our place.”

It was situated on the corner of Kennedy Street and Clarence Street, you entered by a small door beside which was that illuminated glass window made up of the bottoms of wine bottles.

You went down a flight of stairs where there were a dozen tables with red table tablecloths, and a bar with I think the oven beyond that.

At the back was the entrance to the lavatories which were shared with the Isola Bella and above you there were a set of large pipes which I always assumed were to do with the ventilation.

The other end of Kennedy Street, 2017

The menu came on a large piece of white card with a picture of Vesuvius and list of half a dozen pizzas.

It was simple, cheap and friendly.

Once when I was with a works colleague who was a linguist and attempting to show off his Italian he spent a full five minutes conversing with the waiter in Italian only to discover the waiter was Spanish.

Such are the silly moments that stick in your memory and despite these and many other memories I have no pictures of either the outside or the interior.

But someone will, and in the fullness of time I hope will share them.

And it was while I was browsing the net for pictures that I came across an article from the Manchester Evening News recording the death of the owner of the Bella Napoli.

And from the Pizzeria I Decumani****

This was Evandro Barbieri who arrived in Manchester from Milan in 1958 aged 21.  He began work as a waiter in the Midland Hotel and in 1970 opened the Isola Bella, followed by a series of other Italian restaurants.**

If I look hard enough I will I suppose find out when it closed but that won’t do anything for my memories, so I don’t think I will bother.

Instead I shall think also of the cannelloni which in those red and cream ceramic dishes,and which if you weren't careful was so hot it burned your mouth.

Later long after the Bella Napoli had gone we would take each of the older kids for a special birthday meal at an Italian restaurant, each had their own favourite.

For Ben it was the Isola Bella, for Josh Bella Italia and for Saul that one on the corner of Deansgate and Blackfriars Street.

It's pity they couldn't have shared Bella Napoli.

Location; Manchester

Picture; Naples in 2017 from the collection of Saul Simpson, Kennedy Street, 2017 courtesy of Andy Robertson and a pizza from the Pizzeria I Decumani

*Pizza, https://chorltonhistory.blogspot.co.uk/search/label/Pizza

**Tributes to Italian pioneer 'who brought pizza to Manchester', Todd Fitzgerald, December 14 2012, updated January 24 2013, http://www.manchestereveningnews.co.uk/news/greater-manchester-news/tributes-to-italian-pioneer-who-brought-698919

****Pizzeria I Decumani, Via dei Tribunali, 58 80138 Napoli Italy‎ +39 081 557 1309

Strolls with a camera ………… Bulls Brow ……

 Last week Andy Robertson was in Rochdale on one of his strolls with a camera.

And as he does, he went off the beaten track and wandered down Baille Street and discovered Bulls Brow and The Walk.

Now if you live in Rochdale, I don’t suppose wither will seem our of the ordinary but if like me you have only been to the town a few times, these two places are a tad fascinating.

And with the light fading on a grey February afternoon, you could conjure up all sorts of fantastical stories.  

But I won’t other than to say I found them both as they were in 1894 and I bet there will be someone out there who can tell us more.

Location; Rochdale

Pictures; strolls with a camera, Rochdale, 2024, from the collection of Andy Robertson

When nostalgia is nothing more complicated than a sausage sandwich …….. Bert’s café ...... 1971

Now, we all have our own cherished memories which seem with the passage of time to encapsulate a chunk of our growing up.

Whitworth Street, 1969

For me it is nothing more complicated than a sausage sandwich at Bert’s café on Whitworth Street.

We discovered the place sometime in early 1970 and it remained our collective place to go for the next two years.

Usually it meant missing a lecture at the College of Knowledge, which was just round the corner, and more often than not would be where I fell across Mike, John and Lois, who had also put Bert’s sausage sandwich above lectures in British Social History, the poems of John Donne or French grammar.

Bert's Cafe painted white, 1969

Looking back I suspect the sandwiches were not special, but after the bus ride down the Oxford Corridor from Withington having had no breakfast, and with the knowledge that someone would take the notes, we chose Bert’s over Gladstone.

To some this may seem a trivial piece of personal history, but I think not.

Back then places like Bert’s could be found all over the city centre, although usually down a side street, which you found by luck or by word of mouth.

The food was simple, cheap and catered for everyone.  And because this predated the Café Society, most dishes were a variation on egg sausage, bacon and chips. The coffee was more brown milk and everything also came with promise of baked beans.

And it was just perfect.

Bert’s consisted on one room, with perhaps half a dozen tables, and to the rear a serving hatch.

Whitworth Street, from London Road, 1969

On cold wet days in winter, the heat and smell drew you in, not that you could see anything through the windows which seemed permanently steamed up.

We always seemed to be the only ones there, but the presence of the Police Station and Fire Station across the road must have guaranteed a steady stream of customers until both closed down.

The rest of the stretch from Aytoun Street down London Road consisted of a newsagents, a barber, a warehouse and the pub on the corner.

There was of course also the Twisted Wheel, but I can’t now remember when it relocated to the warehouse, or for that matter when it became Placemate.

But I do remember Bert’s.

Location; Whitworth Street, 1969,

Picture; Whitworth Street, 1969, Courtesy of Manchester Archives+ Town Hall Photographers' Collection,
https://www.flickr.com/photos/manchesterarchiveplus/albums/72157684413651581?fbclid=IwAR35NR9v6lzJfkiSsHgHdQyL2CCuQUHuCuVr8xnd403q534MNgY5g1nAZfY,

Childhood in Chorlton in the 1940's …………part two

The continuing story of growing up in Chorlton in the 1940s by Ann Love

Ann lived on Barlow Moor Road.

"Running the height of the house, was a stained glass window, which illuminated the staircase, and on sunny days made lovely coloured reflections down the stairs.

The middle floor had a large landing, with doors leading off to the two front bedrooms, a small dressing room above the hall, granddads bedroom above the kitchen, the bathroom and bedroom, and a large room over the downstairs workshop.

On the landing were a linen cupboard, and a grandfather clock with a large glass case full of stuffed birds.

Sometimes the clock would strike thirteen times at midnight.

I slept in one of the front bedrooms, which had a huge mahogany wardrobe, about 9ft wide and 6ft high.

Even allowing for the fact that things look bigger when you're small, it was huge...

There were spaces for hanging clothes at each side, the middle door was a mirror, with drawers behind.

When I was about seven, it was fashionable to have lead strips on the windows, and I remember being ill in bed at the time, and watching this being done to our windows.

The man stretched a string w covered in chalk, and snapped it against the window to make a line, then glued the lead strip in place.

I think children used to be ill much more when I was young; I had whooping cough when I was about four, and my parents used to take me to Hoylake, so that the sea breeze would take it away.

I remember that I had been going to Tap and Ballet lessons at a Dance School down Groby Road, but after whooping cough I still had an irritating cough, and had to give it up.

There was a very large room above the downstairs workshop.

It must have been a beautiful room, with a bay window at the side of the house, and another large window overlooking the garden.

When my parents were first married, it was their private sitting room, but in my time it was used for storage – bolts of taffeta for the coffins, rolls of kapok, brass nameplates, and handles for coffins, boxes full of gowns to put on the corpses, as well as several large pieces of ornately carved furniture."

Pictures; the house in the 1950s, and drawings of the interior and exterior from the collection of Ann Love

© Ann Love

Connections ...... Edith Nesbit of Well Hall and William Barefoot Labour politican and councillor for Eltham

Edith Nesbit, circa 1890

Now I like the way that history continues to surprise you, often taking you in directions which you could not have imagined.

Until recently I was not aware that Edith Nesbit had lived at Well Hall and knew only that she had written the Railway Children.

But she was far more than just someone who wrote children’s books.

Her marriage appears to be what we might today describe as an open one and she adopted two children from her husband’s relationship with another woman who was employed as their house keeper.

She was one of the founder members of the Fabian Society, a member of the Social Democratic Federation and wrote and spoke regularly on socialism.

Amongst her friends were H.G. Wells, Bernard Shaw and the Webb’s, all of whom visited the house in Well Hall.

She was also a member of the local Labour Party and it was here she met Tommy Tucker an engineer on the Woolwich Ferry, who she married three years after the death of her husband Hubert.

All of which fits nicely as like Edith, Hubert and Tommy I was also a member of the same local Labour Party.

Woolwich Labour Party was formed in 1903.  At that time the Woolwich constiuency took in Woolwich and Eltham, and even when it was split between Woolwich East and Woolwich West for the 1918 General Election the Labour Party took the decision to stay as one party.

So when I joined in 1966 aged just 16 I was walking with Edith, Hubert and Tommy.

William Barefoot, date unknown

And also William Barefoot who will have known Edith and may well have been a guest at her home in Well Hall.

He was one of the leading forces in the Woolwich Labour Party having been its secretary from 1903 till 1941.*

He had become secretary of the Woolwich Trades Council in 1899 a post he held until 1921, was editor of The Woolwich Labour Journal and the Pioneer a weekly paper.**

Now if I were prone to idle speculation I might well go ‘off on one’ pondering on how well Ms Nebit and

Mr Barefoot knew each other and whether she contributed to either The Woolwich Labour Journal and the Pioneer.

Now the Greenwich Heritage Centre holds both the Journal and the Pioneer but the collection only cover the years 1919-1926, and I am not sure when she left Well Hall.

I know she married Mr Tucker in 1917 and later moved to Friston in East Sussex, and later to East Kent, and died in 1924.

That said I shall go digging elsewhere for both journals and the first port of call will be the archives of the People’s Museum.

Now it would really be nice to discover some of her political writing which in turn will have crossed William Barefoot’s desk and so I shall go looking.

Pictures; Edith Nesbit courtesy of The Edith Nesbit Society, http://www.edithnesbit.co.uk/ and William Brefoot, courtesy of Archives & Study Centre, at the People’s History Museum, Manchester, http://www.phm.org.uk/

*William Barefoot and a day in the archives of the Peoples’ History Museum in Manchester, http://chorltonhistory.blogspot.co.uk/2015/03/william-barefoot-and-day-in-archives-of.html

** ORIGINS AND DEVELOPMENT OF THE LABOUR PARTY AT LOCAL LEVEL, The Woolwich Labour Party, 1903-53, Dr Roger Eatwell, 1982,  http://www.microform.co.uk/guides/R97253.pdf

Chorlton from Alexandra Road 1920 by Nora Templar

Looking towards Chorlton from Alexandra Road, 1920 Nora Templar

It is hard to think that just within living memory there will be people who remember the cows bringing brought back to the farms on the green, and of farmers cutting the harvest crops.

Nora Templar captured this scene looking across the fields from Alexandra Road towards Chorlton in 1920.

Nora was a well local historian who had lived at Dog House Farm from 1910 until the late 1950s. Like her father she was also an artist and some of his work will feature later in the year.

Picture; from the Lloyd collection

Lost and forgotten streets of Manchester nu 21 .......... Parsonage Lane

Now Parsonage Lane really is one of those little side streets which grows wider as you follow it down from Deansgate to Parsonasge.

It was there by 1793 and was already fronted by a selection of properties.

Fast forward half a century and these included a textile factory, the Admiral Hatchlock which also went under the name of Parsonage House, five other properties and the entrance to a closed court.

A search for Admiral Hatchlock drew a blank although I do know that our textile factory had by 1851 become Charlton & Sons Calendar Works which by 1900 had expanded across the road.

Today the original site of the textile factory is a big red office and retail block which is home to the Liquor Store.

And that is the close you will get a to buying a drink on Parsonage Lane because our pub which was still there in 1900 has long gone.

Location; Manchester

Picture; Parsonage Lane, 2016 from Deansgate from the collection of Andrew Simpson

Painting that house in Eltham for just £4 12s 6d ............

I don’t do nostalgia and I am very quick to always point out that prices in the past must always be compared to take home pay.

But that said I have to admit paying £4 and a bit for having the outside of your house painted does seem eye watering.

The figure comes from a short extract taken from The Woolwich Story, which was published in 1970.

It is an excellent book containing heaps of information about the history of Woolwich including this short extract about Eltham at the beginning of the 1930s.

“This period saw the disappearance of the ‘Cinder Path’, the rough short cut to the older houses in Grangehill and Westmount Roads, before Westmount Road was connected to Well Hall Road.
Houses here and on the Castlewood Estate were being sold for £700.  Unlike most Eltham property these were freehold.  My own house near the Catholic Church of the Martyrs cost £650. 

 I arranged a mortgage under the Small Dwellings Acquisition Act and borrowed the balance. Today [1970] it is worth at least £3000.

In 1930 I paid £4 12s 6d for a highly satisfactory exterior decoration which would cost £48 today. Hence the popularity of ‘Do it yourself’.

In 1931a man varnished our front door for 3sand our baby’s pram cots£5. 5s. 0d

My post pinhead suit for the christening was made to measure for £4 10s.0d and just before the second war came along, we bought a 14½ square yard Axminster carpet for £9 9s.0d."

In 1930 the average wage for a timework labourer in the engineering field was just under a shilling per hour; it dipped in 1933-4, then climbed again to around 1s 2d by 1938.

Most workers in heavy industry and agriculture, who were male, were paid proportionately more than female workers in the same or other sectors.

 In October 1938, the average hourly wage for adult males was just under 1s 6d, nearly double the average hourly wage for women, which was 9d. **

Location; Eltham in the 1930s

Picture; cover, The Woolwich Story, 1970

*The Woolwich Story, E.F.E. Jefferson, 1970

**Wages in the 1930s, http://www.ehow.co.uk/info_12269131_wages-1930s.html

The multilingual tram …… some confused identity ……and a street grid

So just as you think you are in the French town of Strasbourg, along comes a blue tram with Welcome in Italian embellished on the side.

And to add to the confusion my travelling chum who snapped "Benvenuto tram car 3001" tells me that "here we are in Strasbourg and the trams are mainly white with an occasional blue one".

All of which should not be that confusing to anyone who knows a little of Strasbourg’s history which is a city which has ping ponged between Germany and France.

In the Middle Ages it was governed by the bishops of Strasbourg, and then for four hundred years it was a free imperial city, before being seized by the French in 1681, who subsequently lost it to the newly created Germany in 1871, only to go back to France after the Great War before them briefly being occupied by the Nazis from 1940.

And then after it was liberated by the 2nd French Armoured Division under General Leclerc in November 1944 it was  again a French city.

So some might say my multilingual tram is just covering all the bets, and I have to confess it does in fact have messages in other languages along with the French and German national flags. 

The flags may seem an odd addition given the history but my Wikipedia my Wikipedia tells me that the   service is “one of the few tram networks to cross an international border, [and as well as taking you around Strasbourg will whisk you off] “to  Kehl in Baden-Württemberg, Germany”.

Leaving me just to add "The Strasbourg tramway (French: Tramway de Strasbourg, German: Straßenbahn Straßburg; Alsatian: D'Strossabàhn Strossburi(g)), run by the CTS, is a network of six tramlines, A, B, C, D, E and F . The first tramline in Strasbourg, which was originally horse-drawn, opened in 1878. 

After 1894, when an electric-powered tram system was introduced, a widespread network of tramways was built, including several longer-distance lines on both sides of the Rhine".*

But it wouldn’t be a communication from my travelling friend if I didn’t include one of those cast iron street grids which I delight in collecting.

This one has that romantic and catchy inscription …… "Strasbourg Eurometropole Assainissement" which google translate offers up as …. "Strasbourg Eurometropole Sanitation".

So that is it.

Leaving me just to include  those two trams again .....  if for no other reason than  they also show the tram stops where passengers can shelter, wait for their tram or just take pictures of trams.

And yes I also collect tram stops.

Location; Strasbourg

Pictures, blue trams, white trams and a street grid, 2024

*Strasbourg tramway, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Strasbourg_tramway#Future_extensions

A house with a story

Now we all have favourite buildings but this is not one of mine.

And yet there is a remarkable story here which takes us back to the early years of commercial photography and the Ireland Photographic Studios which began up in Newton Heath as a side line and became an important family business in the centre of Manchester.*

The Ireland family prospered as commercial photographers and eventually settled here in this house.

The business was taken over by Charles Ireland whose father began the studios and he briefly lived in the house which is now the Buddhist Centre on High Lane but was once the Art School of Tom Mostyn.

So there you have it.

*It started with a picture, https://chorltonhistory.blogspot.com/search/label/Charles%20Ireland

Picture; from the collection of Andy Robertson

Paradise Walk ..... almost a lost Manchester Street .... but not quite

 Paradise Walk ought to be one of those twisty little byways which to misquote the poem is “half as old as time”.

Store Street, 1920 looking for Paradise Walk

It was a place I had never come across despite many happy hours wandering the area between Ducie Street and Store Street.

It was Sean Kelly who alerted me to its presence today, with “Could I suggest Paradise Walk, off Ducie Street, Andrew? It’s a sort of short cut and I suspect a lot of history......”, adding “it's been well poshed up, relatively, since around 2000. Wonder whether the Central Library archives have a photo”.

On a warm summer’s day with little else to do, I can see its attractions, because it starts as a narrow pathway sandwiched between a tall building,  before joining the towpath of the Ashton Canal and exiting by a set of steps onto Store Street.

But as delightful as the walk can be, you do have to look for it, and it’s easy to miss both starting points.  

The area in 1894

The Ducie Street entrance is almost opposite where Ducie Street joins Aqueduct Street, while access from Store Street is up a flight of stone steps beside the arch of the aqueduct which carries the canal over the road.

Still I thought I was dealing with one of those very old routes, and mused that here could be all that was left of a closed court which long ago had lost its houses.

But not so, it does not appear on the OS map for 1849, Adshead’s map of 1851, or subsequent ordinance survey maps into the 1950s.   

In 1951 at the Ducie Street end there was a Whittles Croft, which sixty years earlier had been Whittles  Croft Wharf.

And yes, once a long time ago that stretch of Ducie Street which twists away up to Pigeon Street was Whittles Croft and Mather Street. 

Whittles Croft Wharf, 1939

So I await those in possession of more recent maps to pinpoint when Paradise Walk emerged.

If I had to guess, I reckon it will be sometime at the turn of the century when work was undertaken on the canal ….. but I could be wrong …… probably am wrong.

Sorry Sean.

Location; Ducie Street/Store Street

Pictures; Store Street, 1920 looking for Paradise Walk, T Brooks, m10640,and Whittles Croft, 1939, m53789, courtesy of Manchester Libraries, Information and Archives, Manchester City Council, http://images.manchester.gov.uk/index.php?session=pass  Ducie Street/Store Street, 1894, from the OS map of South Lancashire, courtesy of Digital Archives Association, http://digitalarchives.co.uk/ 

 

Treasures from adventures in Peckham and Greenwich .............

To this day I wonder what happened to the gas mask and the replica18th century cap gun we found on our adventures.

Andrew Simpson, 1959

They weren’t found on the same day and now almost sixty years after the discoveries I have no clear idea of when we actually came across them.

We found the gas mask in a row of derelict houses on Queens Road up past the station.

I always thought that the block had been the victim of the Blitz, but it is more likely they were just awaiting demolition having done seventy or so years and were too tired to be saved.

And on what was a grey indifferent winter’s day with the light fading Jimmy, me and John Cox went exploring in the houses.

I remember they were still pretty much intact and somehow we got inside, wandered around and came across a pristine gas mask, still in its box.

It had that shinny look as if it had just come off the production line, with not a mark or scratch.

The filter I remember was white and there was a green painted strip around the black nozzle and I have no idea what happened to it.

It will have been the prize of the day but who took possession of it or what they did with it is lost.

Walking the tunnel, 2017

I do know that the cap gun stayed with me for a while and may have lingered around the house till we moved out to Eltham.

It had been found on one of our regular walks through the Greenwich Foot Tunnel, somewhere midway when the incline ends and you start to see the other end.

As adventures go it was always one of the good ones.  Aged ten there was the slight thrill at being under the River with all that water above you, and more often than not you were almost on your own, making the place just that bit scary.

Looking down to the Greenwich Foot Tunnel, 1977

Added to which there were the echo of your voices and then the sound of strange footsteps which would take an age before you could identify the person they belonged to.

Sometimes that led to the guessing game. Grown up or kid, male or female, old or young?  There were endless permutations and it lasted as long as it took for the mystery person to appear or how soon we bored with the game.

Finally there was the exit into that other place and having got there we felt obliged to stay in the small park and gaze out back across the river towards home.

But mindful that we were on someone else’s turf the stay was always short.

The Woolwich Foot Tunnel, 1978

What I do find curious is that we never used the Woolwich Foot Tunnel, that had to wait until the family moved to Eltham, and with the counter attraction of the Ferry, walking under the Thames was never going to happen.

By which time my Peckham adventures were over.

But in rediscovering them I remembered one last find, which came from the old Gaumont on Peckham High Street.  It wasn’t one I often went in preferring the ABC on the Old Kent Road but it was there that I found a shed load of those old film cuttings, which were small but when held up to light revealed an image.

The trouble of course was that there was little chance of ever re-sequencing them and in a matter of months they were thrown away. Just when I had come across them is also forgotten but I do know that the cinema closed on May 15th 1961, bowing out with Norman Wisdom in the “Bulldog Breed”and “The Final Dream”.

Such are the discoveries made on adventures.

Pictures; the foot tunnels, April 2017 from the collection of Neil Simpson, Looking down to the foot tunnel, 1977 from the collection of Jean Gammons, Andrew Simpson, circa 1959 and the Woolwich Foot Tunnel, 1978, from the collection of Andrew Simpson

One historic Withington building …. a charity and a fun day with a purpose

Now  Withington Baths on Burton Road is the sort of place you’d like to plan a fun day with a purpose.

It opened in 1913 and after a century of serving the area was saved from closure in 2015, when the pool was  taken over by Love Withington Baths, which is a community-led charitable organisation.

That story is covered in detail on their site so rather than lifting someone else’s research I shall just point you to the link link.*

Instead this is the story of another charity which on a sunny warm Saturday last week held a fun day involving tubs of ice cold water and a heap of brave and resolute bathers who took the plunge.

The charity is Mandem Meetup “a grassroots charity promoting, correcting and improving the conversation around men’s mental health and wellbeing……. offering a relaxed, comfortable, and judgement-free space built to empower.”

And last week they were given a shedload of ice and what better to do than have a fun day which drew a mixed bunch of men, and women, the old and young who sat in a tub and had a bit of fun.

Added to which there were plenty of friends on hand to give encouragement, assist with the promotion of the charity and a regular flow of passers by who just wanted to join in.

So a good day all round.

A large group of hardy souls took part, more just came for a chat or like me were there for the pictures.

Location; Withington Baths

Pictures; Ice cold in Withington, 2024, from the collection of Andrew Simpson

*Withington Baths, https://withingtonbaths.com/

*Mandemmeet up, https://www.mandemmeetup.org/